Use points and miles to book airline tickets, hotels and travel experiences for friends and family

15.11.2023 - 22:13 / thepointsguy.com / Spirit Airlines / United Airlines

The holidays are a time to spend with loved ones and, for many people, a season of giving. Points and miles can play a key role by making family travel cheaper and more attainable, whether for yourself or as a gift for someone else.

As you might expect, some travel companies make it much easier than others to book travel for someone else. Luckily, there are a few tips to make things go smoother. Let's look at how to use your points and miles to book tickets for a loved one.

Many airlines make it very easy to use your miles to book a ticket for someone else. The most important detail is that you don't need to transfer your miles to someone else to book a ticket in their name.

While many airlines offer mileage transfers, it's often at a steep price. For example, United Airlines charges $7.50 per 500 miles transferred plus a $30 transaction fee. That means if you found a 25,000-mile award flight for someone, you'd spend $405 total just transferring them the miles.

Instead, you can book the ticket directly from your account. You'll need personal details like their date of birth and legal name as it appears on their ID, but you can book a ticket for another passenger almost as easily as if you were booking for yourself. Most airlines make it pretty straightforward to book an award ticket online. Sometimes, your elite status or credit cards may help a family member secure a better price on an award flight.

United, for example, provides extra award inventory to MileagePlus elite members. And if you hold certain United cobranded credit cards, you can access more award inventory even when booking for others.

This can be crucial for saving miles on award tickets. Unfortunately, your elite status won't help you extend benefits such as free extra-legroom seats (Economy Plus on United, for example) or free checked bags, as you'd have to also be on the reservation flying with your loved one for those perks to extend to others.

Though rare, some airlines restrict booking to immediate family members. One example that comes to mind is All Nippon Airways Mileage Club, which only allows you to book tickets for yourself and family members with up to two degrees of kinship. In other words, you can book tickets from your account for spouses, children, parents, grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles. Unfortunately, you can't book award tickets for your best friend or third cousin.

Some low-cost airlines, such as Frontier Airlines and Spirit Airlines, offer discount memberships. Frontier's Discount Den program can be a great deal for families thanks to its Kids Fly Free program. Spirit's Saver$ Club can also save you money on select flights. Both programs work great for booking cheaper flights for a group of people.

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